> This is Dallas County Judge Tonya Parker, the first gay person elected judge in Dallas County, and the first openly gay African-American elected official in Texas history. She's refusing to marry straight couples until she is also able to marry.

|||||UGANDA: President Yoweri Museveni clarifies his country's position on those pesky homosexuals. "Homosexuals - in small numbers - have existed in our part of black Africa. They were never prosecuted, they were never discriminated, but the difference between us and... Western Europe is the promotion of homosexuality, as if it is something good." W**ker.

> Review: For the Ferryman: A Personal History, by Charles Silverstein. "Silverstein's 'personal history' gives the reader a different tale: twenty years of dark and stormy nights between a modern-day Magnus Hirschfeld and a tragic beloved... What's most disturbing is that even a shrink of Silverstein's stature can be sucked into a tumultuous psycho-dependent relationship."

|||||Whitney Houston: "We're coming up on hour three of Whitney Houston's Going Home memorial and I don't know how my eyelids are still able to open after sitting through Kevin Costner talking for 35 million minutes about himself, himself, himself, himself, Jesus, himself, himself and how he himself put Whitney in The Bodyguard when nobody else wanted her in it. Oh, and he talked about himself and how Whitney is auditioning before God now (or something like that). The dozens of people taking a nap with their eyes open should've been the choir's cue to sing Kevin off the stage, because DAMN. Dances with Woofs was shorter than Kevin's speech."

> DTLA - a new "gay" drama series - is coming, with a multiracial cast of boys, girls, gays and straights. And it looks amazing. What's even more amazing is that this human confetti isn't British: it's American. Years after the racial segregation of Queer As Folk and Noah's Arc - and the failure of the similarly monocultural The DL Chronicles to secure funding - it seems like real change is coming to our screens. Now watch for the blogosphere meltdown as haters' minds implode at the thought of Darryl Stephens having a white boyfriend. DTLAon Facebook. DTLAat Kickstarter. Watch the trailer.

< This is 14-year-old Rafael Morelos, who hanged himself on 29th January after a sustained campaign of homophobic bullying.

> Family and friends of the boy gathered for a vigil last week. Friends said, "He told me he got shoved and punched in the face in PE in the locker room at Cashmere. He was tired of people saying that his little brothers would follow in his footsteps and be gay too."

|||||The countdown to World Pride 2012. London will host "the largest un-ticketed event in Europe" in July...

...But Brighton Pride - which has soared in popularity over the last ten years - is in debt and set to go bust.

|||||Craig Roy convicted of murdering 16-year-old Jack Frew. The boys had been sexually involved, and "Roy's defence team said he was worried that Jack would tell his boyfriend, Christopher Hannah, about their previous sexual contact."

> Three boys have been given life sentences for the 2011 murder of 18-year-old Londoner Daniel Graham. Jordan Williams, 17, Colin Aghatise, 16, and Lennie John, 24 murdered Graham "in circumstances of horrific and merciless brutality."

|||||Meanwhile, 20-year-old Sodiq Adeojo has been jailed for 30 years for the 2010 murder of 17-year-old athlete Sylvester Akapalara.

< 17-year-old Beau Isagba has been found guilty of the attack on Malaysian student Ashraf Rossli during last summer's London riots. A YouTube video showed the student being helped by a group of teenagers after being atttacked by another group of looters - who then proceeded to punch him in the face and rob him.

> Model hangs himself after years of crippling toothache. Dorian Thomson suffered from Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome.

EUROPE NEWS

< This is 30-year-old Irishman Kenneth John Gemmell, who went overboard on a gay cruise in Mexico, on 3rd February. The vessel was the Allure of the Seas, the world's biggest cruise ship. His family want answers.

|||||KENYA: "Until a new anti-homosexuality bill caused a wave of homophobia in Uganda, John and Paul could hold hands in the streets of the capital Kampala and kiss in night clubs.Then the nightmare started - people began insulting and then assaulting them, and then they had to run away to Kenya. The couple have been in Nairobi since May of last year."

|||||GAMBIA: President Yahya Jammeh declares: "We know what human rights are. Human beings of the same sex cannot marry or date. If you think it is human rights to destroy our culture, you are making a great mistake because if you are in the Gambia, you are in the wrong place then."

< Review: Why are Faggots so Afraid of Faggots: Flaming Challenges to Masculinity, Objectification, and the Desire to Conform, edited by Mattilda Bernstein Sycamore. "29 personal essays offer a refreshingly heterogeneous antidote to the pervasive subcultural norms, an attempt to subvert the idea that '…the intoxicating visions of gay liberation have given way to an obsession with beauty myth consumer norms, mandatory masculinity, objectification without appreciation, and a relentless drive to police the borders.'"

< Review: Gay In America, by Scott Pasfield. "This book may be an inspiration. It's a paper version of the entire It Gets Better YouTube campaign."

> Review: Lost Story, by Brane Mozetič. "Written in the form of a diary, Lost Storyfollows a young gay Slovenian, Bojan, who’s stuck in a loop of drugs, clubs, sex."

< Review: 98 Wounds, by Justin Chin. "Visceral, unsettling, overwhelming, disturbing, poetic, beautiful, loving, and real. Be prepared to be emotionally and psychologically jarred; to be wounded and healed."

< Daniel Radcliffe talks about anti-gay bullying and why straight kids should show their support. Now that's a role model for kids.

|||||"The biggest misconception people have about my mother is that she was so unhappy. I think people enjoy thinking that - some of them, anyway. They see the tragedy as opposed to the fact that she understood how to play tragedy." Liza Minnelli talks about her mother, Judy Garland.

> Colin Tarrant, the actor, is dead. He was 59. Tarrant is best known for his role as Inspector Andrew Monroe in the police drama The Bill.

|||||David Kelly, the actor, is dead. He was 82. Kelly is best remembered as feckless builder Mr O'Reilly in Fawlty Towers, but appeared more recently in Tim Burton's Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.

|||||Whitney Houston: In death, her years of struggle resonate with the public. "The public outpouring of emotion over Whitney Houston's passing is filled with mourning for her loss, but also sympathy for her inability to overcome her personal problems."

|||||Whitney Houston: "The sad truth is that her memory will forever be tarnished by her addictions. The images that we carry of her are hard to reconcile with the voice. But that's where I Will Always Love You comes in. Put it on. Turn it up. Close your eyes. Whitney's voice, mere hours after her death, has already proved it can outlive her body. Even if her humanity couldn't handle that tone, posterity certainly can."

|||||Whitney Houston: Towleroad has a fantastic and truthful analysis of Houston's final years - or, more accurately, the media's treatment of her. "The reviewer ended by calling the night 'heartbreaking,' but it's hard not to detect a little glee in that last set of quotation marks. A lot of people wrote things like that, and it's a little queasy-making to think how many of them will be airing sweet sentiments in the coming days; sentiments which are now about six hours out from the last moment when they could have done some good."

|||||Review: D'Angelo, live at Brixton Academy. "For his encore, D’Angelo made the crowd wait 10 minutes before reappearing for a supercharged Brown Sugar. Many fans afforded themselves a wry smile – after a 12-year wait, 10 minutes was nothing. How great it is to have him back."

|||||Review: D'Angelo, live at Brixton Academy. "Heaven sent: the wonderful live return of D'Angelo."

|||||Let's hope D'Angelo has learned a lesson from Houston's tragic narrative, and sticks to the road of recovery. Watch the great man make his return to the stage in Paris.

< Things were looking grim for George Michael for a while there, but it looks like new boyfriend Fadi Fawaz is helping him recover swiftly in the Maldives...

|||||The response to Madonna's half-time show was ageist, Liz W. Garcia claims. I say: Had it been Tina Turner, Aretha Franklin or Annie Lennox, there'd have been no ageist banter. People like saying nasty things about Madonna because, frankly, she's a c**t.

|||||Drag queens Sherry Vine and Pandora Boxx serve up a much more entertaining of Madonna's Give Me All Your Luvin'.

|||||Book yourself a room at Gloria Estefan's Hotel Nacional, where Will Young is Losing Himself...

|||||Here's 16-year-old Marcella Fruehan's video for her song Truth Is. "I wrote this song to express my feelings in support of anti-bullying. As a 16 year old I see a lot going on around me; especially with bullying and the effects that it has on those who are bullied and what lengths teens will go to to "get away" from it all. I want you to know suicide is never the answer. Truth is...you are loved, you are not alone...you are never alone."

"I would also like to take this opportunity to squash the persistent rumours about mysterious 'disappearances' and emphasize that rural and urban areas are now enjoying a life of harmony and peace. I'm sure you're glad to hear this. And I'm happy you're glad."